Working with floating selections

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Mike Rankin shows how to anchor floating selections to any existing layer, or to a new layer in GIMP. He also shows how content that is transformed or copied and pasted is placed in a special floating layer, not attached to the other layers in the file. Floating selections must be anchored in order to continue working in the file.

- [Presenter] As you work with layers in GIMP,…it's important to understand the concept…of floating selections,…and how to anchor floating selections to layers.…So, let's see how they work.…In the exercise fell for this movie, I have gone ahead…and made a selection of the surfboards and kept is active…when I saved and closed the GIMP file.…So, it becomes active when the file is opened.…Now, with the surfboards selected, let's say I wanted…to copy it to a new layer.…I can press Control or Command C to copy…and then Control or Command V to paste.…

I still see the active selection edges, and let's look in…the layer's dialogue, to see what happened.…Above the original layer, where I had my selection,…a new, temporary layer has been created,…called Floating Selection (Pasted Layer).…At this point, I need to either work with…the content in the floating selection,…or anchor the floating selection to a layer.…For example, if I take the Move Tool,…notice if I position my cursor inside the selection,…I have the Move Cursor, and I can click and drag…

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Released

6/13/2017

GIMP is a popular open-source image editor for Mac, Windows, and Linux that has evolved to become a credible option for image editing. In this course, Mike Rankin shows how to use GIMP 2.8 to work with images. After he tours the GIMP interface and familiarizes you with the program's preferences and tools, he takes you through working with selections, layers, layer masks, and paths. He also explains how to adjust canvas and print size, use brushes to edit masks, work with color, retouch photos, work with filters and text, print GIMP documents, and export images for web and print.